CINEMA: The Diving Bell and The Butterfly

The painterly eye of artist-turned-director Julian Schnabel is obvious from the very first scenes of this (kind of) triumph-over-tragedy true story. It is the tale of successful magazine editor Jean-Dominique Bauby (Mathieu Amalric) whose charmed life is shattered when he has a massive brain bleed.

When he finally wakes up he discovers to his horror that although he can hear and see and knows exactly what is going on around him, he can no longer move a muscle, except to blink. He is suffering from ‘locked-in’ syndrome and Schnabel perfectly captures his utter sense of panic and fear by showing proceedings from his point of view. Doctors and nurses around him speak, but he cannot answer them. A fly lands on his nose and he cannot bat it away. His estranged wife (Emmanuelle Seigner) comes to see him with his son and he cannot embrace them. He cannot protest as the doctors sew closed his eye after an infection, thereby further limiting his access to the outside world.

But there is a single, tiny sliver of hope on the horizon. Two nurses are employed to teach him to spell out the letters of the alphabet by blinking with his remaining good eye. He keeps blinking until they reach the letter he wants, then he stops and the whole painfully slow procedure must start again in order for the next letter to be arrived at. In this way Jean-Dominique manages to escape the prison that his body has become and lets the world know exactly what he is thinking and feeling by writing a book about his experience.

Schnabel’s deliberate use of certain images – Jean-Dominique receiving treatment in a swimming pool that gives him a sense of freedom, sitting out in his wheelchair by the sea beside his hospital and staring at the lighthouse which becomes his symbol of strength and safety – give the audience non-verbal pointers into Jean-Dominque’s emotional landscape. Through them Schnabel perfectly captures Jean-Dominique’s frustration, but also his courage and sense of having conquered what seem overwhelming odds.

This is a truly inspiring film made with searing honesty and little sentimentality and anyone watching it will leave counting their blessings.     Dee Pilgrim